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Katyusha Truck
"She isn't one of your half-baked rocket launchers. Katya is the real dealie. She'll fire more rockets in a day than you could hope to fire in a month." :- Disgruntled Katyusha veteran to V4 operator Tactical Analysis * Fly my pretties, fly: The Katyusha is a tried and tested artillery piece. Firing all of its rockets within a few seconds, it rains destruction over a sizeable area in a very short time, and thanks to its speed can quickly scoot off to reload. * They didn't see that one: In addition its rockets, the Katyusha can also drop mines behind it when driving away to deter enemies from pursuit or lure them into a trap. The mines do fairly good damage and will also shock enemies, causing them to slow and leaving them unable to fire for a few seconds. * They're closing in, HELP: Unfortunately, the Katyusha Truck is far from well-armoured, given that it is just a truck. It needs protection when attacking or its barrage will be a short one. Operational History "Pears and apples blossomed on their branches. Mist (was) creeping on the river. Katyusha set out on the banks, On the steep and lofty bank. She was walking, singing a song About a grey steppe eagle, About her true love, Whose letters she was keeping. Oh you song! Little song of a maiden, Head for the bright sun. And reach for the soldier on the far-away border Along with greetings from Katyusha. Let him remember an ordinary girl, And hear how she sings, Let him preserve the Motherland, Same as Katyusha preserves their love." :- Katyusha, a Russian song, composed in 1938 In 1951, barely a few months after the first regiments of the Soviet Black Guard shipped out to the front, a special unit of that organisation became the first to test a new and experimental weapon on the field of battle. The results were devastating, ending in the decimation of a massive concentration of German troops, tanks and vehicles and the chaotic retreat of the panicked German survivors. Pleased by the success of the weapon’s first deployment, Stalin was quick to authorise full scale production of the new BM-12 multiple rocket launcher. Soon, the regiments of the Black Guard were making extensive use of these new artillery pieces. Though the launchers couldn’t fire as many projectiles as a conventional field gun could over an extended period of time, the BM-12’s ability to deliver such a large quantity of explosives in a short window of time appealed to the Black Guard. More importantly, however, was the sheer terror value of such a weapon. Though initially under exclusive Black Guard control, Stalin would later allow units of the regular army to employ the launchers as well. As such, though in time the Black Guard would fall, the BM-12 would continue to see regular service with the Soviet Army, and by the end of the war conventional guns were falling out of favour with the Soviets. As time progressed, the original BM-12 was replaced with newer, superior iterations, the latest of which is the BM-33 Katyusha. Consisting of a rack of forty 122mm high explosive rockets mounted on a general purpose truck, the design of the Katyusha improves upon its predecessor in terms of reload time, payload capacity, and the quantity of high explosives packed into each rocket. In addition, Katyushas are also issued with a supply of electroshock mines, along with an automated mine dispenser—an innovation introduced after a Katyusha driver managed to deter pursuit by Allied forces with the aid of a crate of mines that he come into possession of due to a logistical mess-up. In addition to damaging enemies when they detonate, the electroshock mines also release electrical discharges that slow targets by throwing engine piston firing sequences out of time and make it unsafe to operate weapons for a short time. Though the platform is only marginally better protected than its predecessor, this is an intentional tradeoff--by mounting the rockets on a truck rather than an armoured chassis, the Soviets can produce more Katyushas for less, allowing them to amass them in bulk more easily. Though there are those in the Soviet Army who argue that rocket launchers like the V4 or more conventional field guns are superior, proponents of multiple rocket launchers point to the destructive capability of the Katyusha, something which has been demonstrated dozens of times during the Third World War. Just the Stats Category:Units